by Tawny Taylor
“Not that I want to appear ungrateful, but I’m the kind of girl who likes her privacy in the bathroom.”
“I understand. But I’m not going to risk you falling and cracking open your skull. Sorry.” He hooked his arms under my armpits and lifted me, and within a heartbeat I was extremely grateful he was there holding me up. I probably would’ve fallen over if he hadn’t been.
“Okay?” He asked, holding me tightly.
“Dizzy.”
“I’ll give you a minute.”
As I held my head stationary, my forehead resting against his broad chest, the spinning eased. “Better now. I’d like to wash my hands and brush my teeth.”
“Okay.”
It took some fairly creative manipulations to get me to the sink without falling while he kept a tight hold on me, but we managed. Soon my hands were germ free, my mouth minty fresh, and I was being carried back to the bed.
The descent to the mattress was hell, but once I was horizontal, things settled down again.
“Wow,” I said, closing my eyes. “That was . . . quite an ordeal.”
He said, “I can’t leave you alone for long.”
“Surely this will ease up soon.”
“I’m calling a doctor.” He bent down, brushed his lips against mine, smoothed my hair back from my face. “Don’t move from this bed.”
“Yes, sir.”
He gave me one last kiss on the forehead. “I’ll be back as soon as I can.”
And out he went.
I closed my eyes and let myself drift off.
“Miss Barnes?”
Someone was calling me? Was I dreaming?
I dragged open my heavy eyelids and had a mini heart attack.
There was a strange man standing over me. A strange man with thinning gray hair, a matching five o’clock shadow, and eyebrows in desperate need of grooming.
I jerked upright. “Who—”
“I’m Dr. Feigel. Mr. Maldonado called me,” the doctor explained as he took my wrist in his hand, pressing two fingers to my pulse point.
“Oh.”
He glanced down at his wristwatch for a few seconds, nodded, then reached for what I assumed was his bag, sitting on the nightstand. He pulled out a blood pressure cuff and strapped it on my arm. “What seems to be the problem?”
“I’m really dizzy.”
“Dizzy as in faint? Or dizzy as in feeling a spinning sensation?” he asked.
“The second one.”
“All right,” he said as he squeezed the little rubber bulb, inflating the cuff. It tightened around my arm, cutting off the circulation. “Any other symptoms?” He released the pressure.
“I’m very sleepy. And I . . . don’t remember part of last night. It might be I was sleeping, but I don’t know.”
“Hmmm.” He removed the cuff. “Your blood pressure is a little low.” He put it away, checked some other things—heart, throat, ears, temperature. “I think you should go to the hospital and have some blood tests run.”
As he was working, I noticed I could move my head without the spinning being so bad. “Oh, I don’t know. I think it’s getting better.”
“Are you sure?”
I shook my head, then nodded. “Yes. It is getting better.”
His bushy gray brows scrunched together. “Did you have anything to drink last night? Any alcohol?”
“No. Only water.”
He pulled a little light thing out of his bag and shined it in my eyes. “Did you take any medications?”
“A couple of aspirin.”
“Are you sure that’s the only medication you took?”
A little chill prickled my back. “Yes, I’m sure.” Was he suggesting I was lying? Or I had taken some random pill without knowing what it was? Or did he see something suspicious that I should worry about?”
“I’m not finding anything wrong. You may have a slight infection of your inner ear.” He started putting all his doctor tools back in his bag. “If your symptoms get worse or return, go to the hospital immediately.”
“Will do.”
“Okay. I’m going to leave now. I’ll leave my card on your nightstand. If you have any questions, please call. My answering service can reach me at any time of the day or night.”
“Thank you for coming.” I waited for him to leave, then cautiously moved to the edge of the bed. I pushed myself upright. So far, so good. I eased to my feet. No spinning. I walked slowly, keeping a hand on the bed until I’d reached the end. No problems. I made it to the bathroom without falling, locked myself in, and cranked on the shower.
Ten minutes later, I was clean and feeling almost as good as new. As I pulled open the door, I tried to shove aside a troubling thought—that maybe Kameron had slipped me something for some reason. I hadn’t mentioned the possibility to the doctor partly because it didn’t make a lot of sense to me, and also because Kameron had hired him. Instead, I got myself cleaned up then, sitting on the edge of the bed, used my phone to do some checking on the Internet.
A listing of my symptoms landed me on a page about Rohypnol, also known as the date rape drug.
Dizziness.
Hot and cold sensation.
Nausea.
Difficulty moving.
Unconsciousness.
Memory loss.
Oh. My. God! I was drugged.
“You’re up.”
Who?
My heart leaped. My hands flew up. The phone sailed several feet through the air, hit the dresser, and landed with a thump on the carpeted floor.
I jerked around, looking over my shoulder.
Kameron.
“Are you all right?” he asked, hurrying to me.
“I’m fine.” I tried to produce a convincing smile.
His brows scrunched. “Hmmm.” Circling around the bed, he grabbed my phone and glanced at the screen before handing it to me.
I looked at it as my fingers curled around it. Thankfully, the impact had made it switch over to another screen. I was now on a web page about women’s health. “You startled me.”
“I see that.” He sat next to me on the bed. The mattress sank, making my weight shift toward him. Trying not to be obvious, I scooted over a little to avoid rolling up against him. “Are you sure you’re okay?”
“I’m not dizzy anymore. But I’m still tired.”
“What did the doctor say?” he asked.
“He mentioned some kind of infection. Of the inner ear.”
“You’d better rest, then.”
“Yes.”
Actually, what I needed was to get to the hospital and have a blood test run. I needed to know for sure whether I had been drugged.
Who would drug me, besides Kameron? And who would have had the opportunity?
Nobody.
If I had been drugged, it would have had to be him.
But then again, if it was Kameron, why would he do that? Why?
Swinging from confused to angry and back to confused again, I tried to decide how to handle the situation. If Kameron had drugged me, he wouldn’t want me to have blood tests. He wouldn’t want me to know. No, I needed to get to the hospital on my own somehow.
But there was another question weighing on my mind. How long could the drug be detected in my body? Was it already too late?
Hiding my phone under the covers, I lay back down. “I’m really sleepy.”
“Okay.” He leaned over me, eyes searching mine. Was he trying to determine whether I knew the truth? Or was he as worried about me as he appeared to be?
If that wasn’t genuine concern I saw in his eyes, the man was one hell of an actor.
He angled down and rested his mouth against mine. It was a soft kiss that made me feel hot and cold at the same time.
Hot because my nerves were simmering.
Cold because I was scared too.
All this time, I’d assumed this man was trustworthy. Why? Why would I make such an assumption? Because he was rich? Because he was really, reall
y good looking? Because he was more or less blackmailing me into being his sexual plaything? Weren’t those all reasons why I should have been wary?
He leaned back. “I have some more appointments this morning, won’t be back until later this afternoon. I’ll order you some lunch. What would you like?”
“Nothing too heavy, I guess. Thanks.”
“Okay.” He stood, stared at me some more, then, as if he’d decided I hadn’t figured out what he’d done, nodded and left.
I went right back to that website and started skimming, looking for information on blood tests.
I didn’t find a precise answer to my question, but I located an article suggesting I had as many as seventy-two hours. I grabbed the hotel’s phone and called down to the lobby, asking for a cab. Then I hung up, threw on some clothes, and headed down. Within ten minutes I was sitting in the back of a grungy taxi, purse in my lap, heart in my throat.
If that man had drugged me . . .
God, what would I do? If I tried to sue him, he’d probably go to the police and report what he’d been told about my brother. Could I blackmail him into letting me free of our contract? What good would that do? At best, I’d be knocked back down to purchasing administrator, making a wage that didn’t come close to paying our rent. At worst, I would be let go for some fictitious failing on my part.
Dammit.
The taxi jerked to a stop. “St. Joseph’s Hospital,” the cab driver said with a heavy accent.
Now conflicted, confused, I didn’t move.
What the hell was I going to do?
6
“Miss? We’re at the hospital,” the cab driver repeated. A hospital security guard, pushing a wheelchair, approached the car. The driver said through the open window, “She’s not moving. Maybe you need to help her?”
The guard opened the door and peered in at me. “Miss? Are you okay?”
I shook myself out of my stupor and nodded. “Yes, I’m fine.” Still not sure if I wanted to know the results of the test, I sat in the wheelchair and let the guard wheel me inside. He parked me in front of a registration desk, wished me luck, and returned to his post.
That left me to try to explain to the woman at the registration desk why I was there.
“I . . . I think I may have been drugged,” I said, feeling the backs of my eyes burning.
The woman’s expression softened slightly. With a gentle but professional voice, she asked me all the pertinent questions, had me hand over my driver’s license and insurance card, and then wheeled me into a waiting area.
I sat. And sat. And sat.
Over an hour later, my phone rang.
I checked it. Kameron.
Oh, damn.
I hit the button, answering, “H-hello?”
“Abigail? Where are you? I checked with the front desk, and they told me you left in a taxi?”
Should I lie? Tell the truth? “I’m . . . at the hospital.”
“Why?”
“The dizziness came back. The doctor who saw me this morning told me to go to the hospital if it came back or worsened. So, here I am.”
“Which hospital?” he asked, sounding anxious.
“St. Joseph’s.”
“I’ll be up there in a few minutes.”
“You don’t—”
“Of course I do,” he interrupted.
Click.
He was gone.
He was coming to the hospital.
I panicked for a moment. But then logic prevailed when I reminded myself that it wouldn’t be a big deal if he came. After all, he wasn’t my husband. The hospital would have to protect my privacy. They wouldn’t be able to discuss any test results with him.
He’d have to wait out in the lobby.
Everything is going to be okay.
I sucked in a deep breath and let it out.
“Abigail Barnes,” a nurse announced from an open doorway. I’d watched her call a few dozen names. The patients followed her and then were gone, probably escorted to a bed, diagnosed, treated, and sent home. Finally, it was my turn.
Moving carefully, I stood, smiled to let her know I was Abigail Barnes, and approached her.
“What are we here for today?” she asked as she led me back to a curtained-off area with a bed.
I waited until she’d closed the curtain before I explained, “I—I have reason to believe I was drugged. I want to know what it was.”
“What makes you think you were drugged?” she asked as she wrapped a blood pressure cuff around my left arm.
I rattled off my symptoms while she checked my blood pressure, pulse, and temperature. Then she recorded everything on her clipboard and pulled open the curtain. “The doctor will be in soon.”
And then I sat. And sat. And sat some more. Bored out of my mind, I lay back and closed my eyes. I wasn’t dizzy anymore, but I still felt tired, hung over. I had almost drifted off when I heard the curtains gliding in the metal track overhead. I blinked open my eyes.
The nurse.
“There’s a gentleman in the lobby asking to see you. Would you like me to bring him back?”
“Well . . .” I felt my face turning red. “I’m here because—”
“Got it. I’ll tell him our policy is to only allow family members back.”
“Thank you.”
Off she went.
I tried to relax. But it was hard, knowing Kameron was out there waiting, probably frustrated he wasn’t being allowed back to see me. Was he trying to get back here so he could keep track of what was going on? Was he trying to cover up what he’d done? Or attempting to keep me from finding out?
The more I thought about it, the more I began to suspect him. If he was low enough to use what my brother allegedly did to blackmail me into becoming his personal plaything, what more was he capable of?
My brother had been so right about this. So, so right. And of course, since he’d been such a train wreck lately, I didn’t believe him. Instead, I believed what I wanted to about my new employer and his shady actions.
A young woman in a pair of scrubs strolled in, a clipboard in her hand. She extended an arm, introducing herself as a doctor, and I gave her hand a shake. She asked me some questions, then told me they were going to be collecting both blood and urine samples for testing.
“Will I know the results right away?” I asked.
“It’ll take a while. Probably a few hours.”
“Oh.”
That meant I’d have to return to the condo with Kameron before the test results were in. That also meant it would give me some time to decide what I was going to do if the results came back positive.
It wasn’t in my nature to hide my feelings, so I knew, in my gut, this was going to blow up in my face. If I learned I’d been drugged, I wouldn’t be able to trust Kameron. And I wouldn’t be able to pretend I did. He’d know.
A few minutes later, the nurse returned, took the blood, and left me with a little plastic cup with a lid. She directed me to the bathroom. Once I’d collected the specimen, I returned to my curtained safe zone and stayed put until I was discharged.
Kameron jumped up when he saw me in the lobby, charged up to me. “Are you okay? What did the doctor say?”
“She didn’t have a diagnosis yet,” I said. “They’re running some tests.”
“Okay. Let’s get you back to the condo.” He wrapped an arm around my waist as we walked toward the exit. “I’ve cancelled all my appointments for the rest of the day. I’m not going to leave your side until you’re one hundred percent.”
“I hate for you to miss—”
“Nothing is more important than you right now,” he said, cutting me off. He sounded so sincere.
We stepped outside, and the black BMW, driven by someone else, crawled up, stopping directly in front of us. Kameron opened the door for me, and I ducked in and buckled myself up.
“You didn’t eat the lunch I had sent up. Are you hungry?” he asked as he buckled his own belt.
&nbs
p; My stomach rumbled. “A little, I guess.”
“I’ll order something right now. It’ll be in the suite when we get there.” He whipped out his phone and dialed.
I sat beside him, fighting the urge to cry.
Hours later, I’d eaten and was lying in my bed, staring at the television but not seeing it. My phone was set on vibrate so Kameron wouldn’t hear it. He’d hovered around me for the first couple of hours, fussing over me like I was a sick toddler. I was extremely relieved when he finally gave up on the helicopter act. He didn’t leave the suite, though. I heard him out there, moving around. Footsteps thumping on the carpeted floor. Talking on his phone.
He’d noticed I was acting differently—who wouldn’t? But I’d been able to convince him that my change in attitude toward him had everything to do with my sickness.
I checked the time too often, frequently enough that time dragged. Three hours passed. Four. Five. Six. That doctor hadn’t been lying. Sheesh. Just a little shy of seven hours after I’d been discharged, my phone finally buzzed.
“Miss Abigail Barnes?” I recognized the doctor’s voice.
“Yes, it’s me.”
“We have the results back from your blood and urine tests. We got a positive on both for midazolam. Have you ever taken medication to treat seizures or insomnia?”
“No, I haven’t.”
“The concentration wasn’t high enough to raise a concern of overdose. But it could produce the effects you described.”
A chill swept through my body. “I was drugged.”
I heard Kameron’s footsteps approaching. He’d probably heard me talking on the phone. The door, which hadn’t been shut all the way, swung open.
The doctor said, “If you’d like to—”
“Thank you.” I hit the button, cutting off the call.
My blood was ice cold and yet my ears, face, and neck were burning hot.
He’d drugged me. It had to be him.
The water. I remembered drinking water in the car. That must have been it.
His gaze met mine. “What’s wrong?”
He’d drugged me. God only knew what else he’d done when I was unconscious.
Bastard!
Tears burned my eyes. My nose. I sniffled.
